51 6 PHANEROGAMS. 



to elongated woody shoots. They have the form of short branches covered with 

 decussate scale-like bracts (Fig. 348, C, D); the axis of the shoot ends in an 

 apparently terminal ovule, the nucellus of which has the appearance of being 

 the vegetative cone of the axis, but axillary ovules also occur. In Salishuria the 

 female flowers spring from the axils of foliage-leaves belonging to short lateral 

 branches which annually produce new rosettes of leaves (Fig. 347 A)\ the single 

 flower consists of a stalk-like elongated axis which bears immediately beneath its 

 apex two or more rarely three lateral ovules. Neither in this genus nor in Taxus 

 are there any foliar structures close to the ovules which either from their position 

 or from any other circumstance can be regarded as carpels. In the genus Podo- 

 carpus small flowering shoots are developed, springing in P. chinensis (according 

 to Braun) from the axils of foliage-leaves, in P. chilina from the axils of very 

 small scale-leaves at the end of elongated leafy shoots ; they consist of an axial 

 structure slender and stalk-like below, club-shaped above, and bearing three pairs 

 of very small decussate scales. The floral axis terminates between the upper 

 pair; the ovules, in this case anatropous, with their micropyle turned downwards 

 and towards the floral axis, spring from the axils of this pair ; one ovule however 

 is usually abortive, and the flower becomes one-seeded. In Phyllocladus the lower 

 lateral branchlets of the leaf-like flattened shoots are transformed into female 

 flowers which are raised upon a pedicel and are swollen above into the form of 

 a club, the large ovules standing (according to a drawing of Decaisne's^) in the 

 axils of small leaves. In these two genera the small scales from the axils of 

 which the ovules spring may be regarded as carpels, if it is thought necessary to 

 assume the existence of these organs. 



The ovules of Juniperus communis (Fig. 349, C) stand in whorls of threes 

 beneath the naked extremity of the floral axis, the flower springing as a little 

 shoot from the axil of a foliage-leaf, and its axis bearing whorls of three leaves. 

 The ovules apparently alternate with the three leaves of the upper whorl, and 

 hence must, from their position, be themselves considered as metamorphosed 

 leaves; these leaves of the upper whorl swell after fertilisation, grow together 

 and become fleshy, forming the pulp of the juniper-berry in which the ripe seeds 

 are entirely enclosed ; they may therefore be termed carpels. In the other Cupres- 

 sineae the flower consists of decussate whorls of two or three leaves, which grow 

 considerably after fertilisation and attain a considerable size, enveloping the seed 

 and forming a pericarp which may therefore correctly be said to be formed of 

 carpels. In Sabina the pericarp is fleshy and berry-like, as in Juniperus; in the 

 other genera, on the other hand {Thuja, Cupressus, Calliiris and Taxodium), 

 the carpels become woody and assume the form of stalked peltate scales, or of 

 valves separating from one another longitudinally {Freneld) ; these are closely 

 approximate during the development of the seed, but afterwards open to allow 

 the ripe seeds to fall out. The erect ovules of Cupressineae sometimes appear 

 to stand in the axils of the carpels; but it is clear in other cases that they 

 spring from the carpels themselves, either low down near their point of insertion 



^ [See Le Maout and Decaisne's Descriptive and Analytical Botany, edited by Dr. Hooker, 

 London. 1873, p. 747.] 



